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Star rating: Heat rating:

Librarian turned sorcerer. Sorcerer turned hero. Hero turned puppet.

The Solaris Empire found victory in the North and, at the cost of her heart and her innocence, Vhalla Yarl has earned her freedom. But the true fight is only beginning as the secret forces that have been lurking in the shadows, tugging at the strings of Vhalla's fate, finally come to light. Nowhere is safe, and Vhalla must tread carefully or else she'll fall into the waiting arms of her greatest foe. Or former lover.

No matter how far she ran or how many people she met, an invisible hand pulled Vhalla back to the crown prince of the Solaris Empire.

Water’s Wrath follows on several weeks after the end of Earth’s End. Vhalla is on the hunt for information, and while she does learn a bit, you could say the information finds her. I don’t want to say too much for the sake of keeping the spoilers to a minimum, but you can expect a lot of travelling, new and old faces and, as indicated by the cover, for Vhalla to finally find her way to the Crystal Caverns.

As is typical of Kova’s writing, this book was filled with twists. Who you thought were the Big Bad turn out to be mere pawns in a much bigger game. Water’s Wrath is when the real deal shows up, the person who’s been pulling the strings all along.

Kova is great at balancing action with character development, and I grew to love all my old favourites even more, particularly Fritz, Baldair and Jax. For reasons, this book involved more of Vhalla with her friends than with Aldrik, which was both great for the story development and bad for me. I’m sorry, but I am a big Vhaldrik fangirl. Those two are meant to be together, and keeping them apart hurts them and me.

Aside from her reaction to something towards the end (see the spoiler discussion below), I was with her mentally all through the story; she is me and I am her. Actually, she is who I want to be, with her incredible maturity, intelligence and determination to improve and learn. And Aldrik. OH, ALDRIK. There is a reason I love him so much. He developed so much as a character in this book, really growing into himself and showing strength by showing his vulnerability. I had chills at the very end!

As is also the norm for Kova’s writing, your feelings are not safe. Within chapters, I was crying and whimpering. However, this was just the warm-up. My emotions ranged from terror to rage to heart-swelling hope. Nothing compared, though, to the building agony I felt over the course of several chapters. While nothing will match how I felt at the end of Fire Falling, this book came pretty damn close to destroying me.

I am not 100% happy with Water’s Wrath, though. Something that happened towards the end made me a little nervous about continuing the series, which I discuss in the spoiler section below. But I’m going to trust Kova on this, as I’m starting to learn that she always has a good reason for tearing you apart. Though it wasn’t my favourite book of the series, it was still fantastic, and I can’t wait to get my hands on the series finale, Crystal Crowned!

Rating breakdown

Plot

Characters

World-building

Pacing

Writing

Cover

Overall:

Vhaldrik in a song

I shared this on Twitter, and I stand by it. The song ‘You & I’ by PVRIS encapsulates the feeling between Vhalla and Aldrik in Water’s Wrath for me. Imagine Vhalla singing this!

Just read these lyrics!

I know it’s warmer where you are
And it’s safer by your side
But right now I can’t be what you want
Just give it time

And if you and I
Can make it through the night
And if you and I
Can keep our love alive, we’ll find

We can meet in the middle
Bodies and souls collide
Dance in the moonlight
When all the stars align
For you and I, for you and I, oh

I know it’s cold when we’re apart
And I hate to feel this die
But you can’t give me what I want
Just give it time

And if you and I
Can make it through the night
And if you and I
Can keep our love alive, we’ll find

We can meet in the middle
Bodies and souls collide
Dance in the moonlight
When all the stars align
For you and I, for you and I, oh

But for now we stay so far
‘Til our lonely limbs collide
I can’t keep you in these arms
So I keep you in my mind

But for now we stay so far
‘Til our lonely limbs collide
I can’t keep you in these arms
So I keep you in my mind

(Reaching out, can’t feel you now)

Can we meet in the middle?
Bodies and souls collide
Dance in the moonlight
When all the stars align
For you and I, for you and I, oh

Spoiler discussion section

Vhalla

View Spoiler »Here’s where I might lose some friends, but guys, the end makes me a little bit worried. Vhalla losing her magic is not something I expected…which is why I should have expected it because we are dealing with the work of an evil mastermind.

The thing is, I don’t know if I’ll enjoy Crystal Crowned if Vhalla doesn’t get her magic back.

I can see it going two ways:

1. Vhalla won’t get her magic back and will prove to everyone she can be a BAMF on her merits alone.
2. Vhalla will find some teeny tiny chance to get her magic back and then kick some serious ass.

I am hoping so hard that Darth Kova goes with the second one, but, naturally, all my begging and pleading with her has proven fruitless, with her cackling evilly to herself.

The reason I don’t want option 1 is, even though it’s has a Great Message, it’s not why I came into the series. Maybe that’s selfish of me, but I want to read about magic and Vhalla’s awesome powers. I also love how her magic combines with Aldrik’s. Permanently losing her powers will change her dynamic in the group and make her “weak” in some ways because she won’t be able to hold up against her magical friends and foes. It’ll mean Aldrik has to protect her, when she should be protecting and fighting for herself.

The other thing about the end is that I don’t feel like she freaked out enough about it all. She lost a big part of her identity, something that’s been with her before she knew about it. She’s effectively been *amputated*. I’m really hoping she’ll have a massive breakdown in CC before seeking out a way to restore her magic.

View Spoiler »Ok, maybe not much of a discussion but AFOWHEFOIEWOHWOEHOWEF WHY.

In all seriousness, though, I understand the point being made. Baldair was a great soldier and had so much life. The irony of him being taken down by a cold is enormous.

I cried so hard and yelled a lot at Darth Kova while reading these chapters. There was a lot of “PLEASE TELL ME HE’S NOT GOING TO DIE” until he died. Then I cried and cried and screamed and cried. I wasn’t really Baldair’s fan in Air Awakens, but I loved him to pieces by Water’s Wrath.

And someone did point out to me that he got to say good bye and have his family with him, which beats the hero’s death.

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0: Couldn't finish1: Want my precious reading hours back2: Could have done without it3: It was good, but it's not an essential read4: Really liked it and glad I picked it up5: Absolutely loved it and would read again

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